Unearthing the Past

Digging Up Dessa – Theatre Above the Law

Dessa is a budding paleontologist. Following a school trip to the natural history museum, is outraged to learn that a wall of photos to the fathers of paleontology is missing one of its founding mothers, Mary Anning, who made several major discoveries, but is more remembered for being the inspiration for the rhyme “She Sells Seashells by the Seashore.” She shares a special connection to her because she is the one female paleontologist in a book she received from her father, who recently passed away. The play unfolds watching Dessa deal with both her loss and the struggle with how the world will see her and other women.

So, I’m on record in several reviews here expressing…ambivalence…about child actors. Too often their performances, through no fault of their own, are either disconnected from the adults in the show or fall into the category of “tiny adults,” where their reactions feel like unrealistic for their age. Happily, both leads here turned in organic, grounded performances and their characters felt like their age, and not adults pretending to be that age. Star Smith as Dessa and Anders Danielson as her unwilling science fair partner Nilo both did really good work at grounding the play’s exploration of family and legacy.

There is a directness to this story in both the writing and the acting that really struck me. People reckoning with an unfair society or truths about their family are common themes across drama, but in the ‘grown-up’ version, they’re a little more buried, no pun intended. The argument in Albee play is never really about whatever started it. Here, the problems and conflicts are more literal, but in the hands of these actors, it reads as earnest rather than shallow.

The play moves briskly through its 75 minute runtime and the end result was a show I found really charming. If you are looking for a theater experience the whole family can enjoy, I think this more than hits the mark.

Recommended

Reviewed by Kevin Curran

Presented April 28 – May 22, 2002 by Theatre Above the Law at The Jarvis Square Theater,1439 W. Jarvis Chicago.

Tickets can be purchased at theatreatl.org.

For more information on this and other shows, visit theatreinchicago.com.